Ozempic Is Killing Sales—Now Big Food Wants Your Cravings Back

There’s been a lot of buzz lately about how GLP-1 weight-loss drugs like Ozempic and Wegovy are reshaping the food industry. With fewer people craving ultra-processed snacks, Big Food is scrambling to adapt—developing new products to regain lost sales. But can they really outsmart these medications? And what does this mean for your health?

In this episode, we break down how the food industry is pivoting, what’s at stake, and how you can take control—choosing where your money goes and what truly serves your health. Tune in for a deep dive into this shifting food landscape and what it means for you.

References

ReciMe | The Ultimate Cooking App

Devotion Nutrition

A study published in JAMA Health Forum found that obesity prevalence and BMI decreased in the US in 2023, marking the first such decline in over a decade

The Top 5 Mistakes People Make When Starting GLP-1 

Audio Stamps

01:00 - Dr. Rentea shares how the ReciMe app makes meal planning effortless and helps her find inspiration for easy, home-cooked meals.

04:13 - Dr. Rentea breaks down how our obesogenic environment makes weight gain almost inevitable without intentional changes.

07:29 - Ultra-processed foods override satiety, driving overeating by design. 

12:14 - Aiming for 80% whole foods helps you better notice how ultra-processed foods affect your hunger and cravings.

18:18 - Dr. Rentea shares how processed foods can be helpful in moderation, but whole foods should be the focus.

21:40 - You get to decide where your money goes, whether it’s supporting local farmers or prioritizing higher-quality, whole foods. It's about aligning your choices with your health and values.

Quotes

“We're in a modern world, but we have an ancient brain. And these foods are hyper palatable. It means that you want more of them than if you were to have naturally occurring food.”

“In a climate where the companies do not care about you, you need to care about yourself.”

“If about 80 percent of the time you're relying on whole based foods, you're able to tell more when you have that processed food, how it affects you.”

“It's unrealistic, given that we're in a super hyper-processed environment, that you would never consume any of that.”

“There is no universe where you're going to measure out a portion of chips and you're going to feel like you've had enough. It's not possible.”

“You're not going to win

All of the information on this podcast is for general informational purposes only. Please talk to your physician and medical team about what is right for you. No medical advice is being on this podcast.

If you live in Indiana or Illinois and want to work with doctor Matthea Rentea, you can find out more on www.RenteaClinic.com

Premium Season 1 of The Obesity Guide: Behind the Curtain -Dive into real clinical scenarios, from my personal medication journey to tackling weight loss plateaus, understanding insulin resistance, and overcoming challenges with GLP-1s. Plus, get a 40+ page guide packed with protein charts, weight loss formulas, and more.

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Transcript

0:28

Welcome back to another episode of the podcast today. We're going to talk about something that I'm sure over the past few months, you've all been seeing a bunch of articles where they're talking about how the food industry is reeling from people buying less snacks and quote unquote junk food. And so they're trying to come back with what are we going to do so that we get back some of that market share. So we're going to dig into this a little bit. And obviously I'm not going to sit here and talk the whole time about the financial side of things, but I want to talk about How this impacts our health and things that we really need to think about. And before I get into that, you know, I always like to kind of give you a little life update or things that I'm loving. I don't know if any of you, I know I've talked about this before, but I don't think I've really stressed how much I'm loving it. Have any of you been using any recipe tracking apps? So I have been loving the one it's called Reasy Me. R E C I M E, all one word, and you can be on social, and when you like a recipe, you can just hit copy, that you get the link for it, and you open up the Rezumi app, and there's paste right at the bottom of it, and it puts in the ingredient list, it puts in links to the actual thing, how you do the recipe. So what I do, and then you can, from there, you can take them and put them into albums. So for example, I have ideas for breakfast, lunch, dinner, snacks. What else do I have in there? Drinks, dips. I think those are like the categories that I have. And so you collect this over time. And the way that I use this on Sundays when I do, I don't want to say meal planning, like it's this huge deal that I sit there, but I kind of think about, okay, what does my week look like? What are the things I want to try or do? And once or twice a month, I want to try a new recipe. I am, as they say, tabula rasa. Is that right? Like just, there's nothing up there when I'm thinking of things to make. And so I'll look through that app through the ideas. I might even be in the food store on Sunday, open it up and say, Hey, what's a different lunch that I haven't tried? And I remember, Oh yeah, I was just going to try that same egg salad that I like, but try it in this type of a wrap. It just gives me the sort of inspiration that I need. So I wanted to rebring that up. If you're someone that You know, index cards haven't worked or you don't have some big system that you've been working on. I think that finding a system is going to be really helpful for you. And for me, it has to be easy, easy, easy. Otherwise, I'm not going to stick with it. I know I have a friend that does a whole Google calendar and has things linked. And it's like this whole thing. And that's incredible. If that's you, I'm honestly, I'm blown away by you. If you have everything. LinkedIn, you know, everyone in the family's on the same page and that's incredible. But that's not me. And actually, I saw actually, I didn't see this. My mom pointed this out to me. She was reading one of these magazines and the statistic that they said in there is that only 57 percent so about one out of two people Actually prepares food. Everybody else is eating food that's prepared already and that number. I'm not shocked by that at all because I feel that a lot of the people that are listening to this podcast, you're not someone who's there. cooking and baking all the time. I mean, I've gotten a little more out there with time, but at the end of the day, a lot of people are really busy. We live in a culture that values productivity and being overproductive all the time. And a lot of the time we don't value the relationship that we have to food and really making it and connecting with it. I think this is something that we need to do more of, but seeing that statistic, I thought, okay, that's good to actually see the data. And again, this is probably very specific to the U S I know that. In other countries, it's much more normalized to make your food. But in the U. S., we've really gone toward this, prepared food, everything kind of packaged, and we could have a whole other conversation about that. But the point being that oftentimes, if we want to start to make even just a thing or two, we have to lower the bar to make it really easy. So apps like Greasy Me have really helped me to start to get into that. So let's get into today's episode. We have talked about this before that we live unfortunately in a very what I'm going to call obesogenic environment. This means that a lot of things promote weight gain for us. And so I'm just going to go over a few here that I often mention on the podcast. So talk about Lack of sleep. This is something that really hurts majority of us. Remember our grull and hunger hormone level is up. That's the hormone that says, Hey, you're hungry, start eating. And it also leads you to be more emotional during the day. Your amygdala is more overactive and that's the emotion center of the brain. So you're making more, when I say emotional choices with food, more urges and cravings, you're not able to kind of stick to plans. Your perspective is lost. So lack of sleep really hurts you. There's lack of exercise. So again, we live in a very sedentary culture, unfortunately. And it's not just that, Oh, I, yeah, I want, I want to exercise. You need to physically have the time. So I'm a really big fan, especially when I first start working with people, depending where they're starting with their weight set point, sometimes. They can't get up and walk. That's literally not a possibility with knee pain or other things like that, but you need to physically have the time, even if it's doing, stretching bands in a chair or following a 10 minute video, you need to have the time to do this. And, unfortunately, everyone does not. Also we don't live in areas that are easy for us to do this. So it's like we have to artificially create the scenarios. So, for example, when I'm walking, let's say it's cold outside, I either need to have the privilege to have a walking pad, a treadmill in the garage, I need to be able to drive to a place that is indoors to walk. There have to be scenarios that align. If you don't have child care during those times, that's a barrier. So anyway, there's always a way through it. But a lot of the times it's not apparently easy how to get extra movement, especially if you're sitting all day at work. Again, these are obstacles. Other things I see ultra processed food. So this is the one that we're going to talk about today. So again, ultra processed food is when there are multiple ingredients in something, majority of them you can't pronounce. You wouldn't be able to make all these ingredients at home. Like you could not actually take these things off your cupboard shelves and make the food. They're preparations of things that have been industrialized. Like they have. done a process to them chemically. They have done that in a lab. You would not be able to do this in your kitchen. You can't pronounce it. It's you can't buy it at the store like individually. Usually these things have more than five ingredients kind of just giving you a little definition of ultra processed food. It's packaged. It lasts a long time. A lot of the time it has a lot of added sugar, a lot of added salt. And so here's what those foods do beyond the fact that they were generally not made for us to consume in large amounts, meaning our body is not used to this type of food. And what we've seen from studies is that if there's a lot of ultra processed food, you consume per day about 500 extra calories. Okay. Okay. That's about one pound of weight gain per week, and maybe it's not that rapid if you, experience slower weight gain, but a lot of patients that come into the clinic, if we look back, they're gaining about 10 pounds a year, and that, that seems like whoa, that's quick, but a lot of people, if they're not working on their health, and they're not getting great sleep, and they're overworking, and not exercising, and food is just convenience all over the place. Suddenly they find themselves in a scenario where the weight set points higher, or they get put on medication that leads their weight set point to go. So there's lots of factors at play, but food is definitely a part of that. So why is this? Cause I always say that we're in a modern world, but we have an ancient brain. And these foods are hyper palatable. It means that you want more of them than if you were to have naturally occurring food. I'm going to tell you one way that it shows up for me. So for example, if I'm eating veggies and tofu and beans, whole based foods, things like that. I just have this point where I say I'm done. Either my stomach gets a signal that the end is full or I'm just like, I can't eat more. I don't want to chew more. There's just a finishing point, and so that is with whole based foods. But when I bring processed food into the mix, so I will give for an example, Cheez Its, it's like, there's always room in the end for that, right? I could always eat a Cheez It. It's just like, there's no off point because it's what I'm gonna call a slider food. You're not even aware that you're eating it. You could have the whole bag and not even. Get any stretch receptor in your stomach saying that oh, there's food here. It's just processed differently in our body And so this ultra processed food We want more of it than what our satiety point would suggest with other food. It's hyper palatable So we're just not used to kind of hitting all these different receptors and the way that it's hitting our brain and we over consume it Okay, the other thing is that it also kind of Messes with what we're expecting from food. So when you have, they are artificially creating in the lab, certain textures and consistencies and flavor profiles that are not normally found in nature. And so you can't ever recreate this with quote unquote normal natural food. It's just not a possibility. So let's kind of dig into that. The reason I got into all this is because I was seeing all these articles recently where people were pretending like this was news, but I think it was just that a guy actually made a good reel on it. But they were talking about how there's a scientist that has a lab. This is all, of course, top secret because no one actually talks about what they're doing on the research and development side of these companies, but that this person's job is to create foods. That will, quote unquote, hack the ozempic effect. So meaning if someone's on a GLP 1, that these foods will be so desirable that it won't matter that they're on a medication, that they will still want them. And everyone was so shocked that the food industry would want to do this. And I don't want to Make a whole political episode here. This is not about like, ah, the food industry. We know that their goal is to make money, to get you to consume more. We've known this for decades. They created the concept of snacks. This didn't used to be a thing decades ago that you would have snacks all the time, right? You would have your meals and you would move on with your day. You would have your meal. You would go work and do whatever you were going to do, and then you came back and had another meal. You were not snacking constantly. So this was a concept that they created because they wanted you to buy more. So their goal is always to up profit. It's a company. That's what they're trying to do now. That's their goal. But what is your goal going to be? And this is what I want you to really think about. So in a climate where the companies do not care about you, you need to care about yourself. That's really the message for today. So you cannot rely on these food companies. I sit here and think, gosh, the moment right now is that collectively we're getting healthier. For the first time ever in decades, when you look at the national overweight and obesity statistics, the curve, instead of going up, has started to go down. This was a landmark moment this past year when we got that data. If you have not seen that, we'll make sure to link it in the show notes. Traditionally, the statistics have been going up, up, up, up, up this, this epidemic with weight, and it not only leveled off, but actually started to go down. This is incredible. So given that we're having this health moment, I really don't understand why the. food industry doesn't just go to creating all products that have more protein in it and fiber and make things in combinations that are amazing. But you know why it's not a priority because these things would not taste the best. Okay. They would not taste the best. Once you start to pull it. Fibers and whole foods and stuff into them, they expire quicker. So there's no priority in wanting to get these things out. When you think about frozen foods, which could be an angle, right? Like I've started to see more products popping up that cater to people, quote unquote, that are GLP one friendly, meaning that I have a little bit more protein and fiber in them, but the frozen food section is very. Like the margins are down, there's lots of transportation issues, and refrigeration is expensive. So anyway, getting down to this, that in my mind, I would love for them to just get on board with the health moment that we're in and create things that support that, but that's not unfortunately where all these companies are going. So, When you have companies that their bottom line is, how do we get you to buy more? What do we need to do? You have to come back to yourself and say, what are my health goals? What is actually going on here? And one thing I want to suggest is that when you are following whatever plan you're following, I think it's a pretty safe bet. If about 80 percent of what you're eating is naturally occurring. So things like bananas. Apples, eggs, right? These are things that are naturally occurring in the world, and I think it's unrealistic given that we're in the super hyper processed environment that you would never consume any of that or not potentially use some of those things in your nutrition. So I want to give an example. A lot of us have gotten used to sweet flavored drinks. And so some of us will use those zero calorie options. And the point is, okay, fine, but maybe every single product that we're consuming during the day won't have that in it. Maybe we're going to pick and choose where you put that in. But that if about 80 percent of the time you're relying on whole based foods, you're able to tell more when you have that processed food, how it affects you. So this is something that I've become very accustomed to is that when I end up having, I'll give an example. I just went to a birthday party this past weekend and I had, do any of you have this by you? It's the nothing bundt the cakes and by the way, they're divine. So there are these little bundt cakes. They sort of think like instead of a cupcake, it's a bundt cake and there's this frosting on top and it was super yummy, super delicious, all the things. But then I noticed later that day and the next day, my hunger was higher. My urges and cravings were higher. And it's because it just got my brain going. It just got my hormones, everything. It got it going and saying, look, that's what you want. Look like, look how amazing this can be. But the reality is. Later that night when I took out my banana with some peanut butter and put a few nuts on it, it did not have the same effect. And I don't think that this is a shocker to anyone, right? So I want to suggest that if you, about 80 percent of the time, you're having hole based things, I think that that other 20 percent is negotiable. And the other thing I want to really focus on with that is that I don't want you to expect a satiety point with it. So I want to give the example with chips. There is no universe where you're going to measure out a portion of chips and you're going to feel like you've had enough. It's not possible. There's no hydration in it. There's no fiber. Like there's nothing that's going to tell your stomach, the stress receptors, she's good. There's food in here. It's not going to go to the brain and say, you're satisfied. You've had enough. You've had enough. If it's going to do anything, it's going to be hitting that fat salt level with the bliss point where it's going to make you want more and more and more. So what I want you to do when you have processed food, I want you to basically consider that to be not something that counts. And what I mean by that is, It's not going to help you get to satiety. It's not going to help you to feel satisfied. If anything, it might create the opposite effect for you. So we're not villainizing it, but we're just really getting on board that what they are doing with these fake flavor profiles and textures that your mouth loves, we don't want to do that all the time because I don't want you to get used to what that feels like, okay? So let me give you an example. If you are getting Certain types of products that are crunchy, smooth, like they have all these different consistencies in them. That's very hard to create in nature. And we can a little bit, cut some nuts to put on top of things and stuff like that. But. It's not normal in nature that there's so many of these different flavor profiles and salty, sweet and smooth and crunchy and all that kind of stuff. This is artificially created. So we don't want to get used to that. That's how it always has to be because it's not possible to do that. Okay, so, I want us to take the emphasis off of the food industry. Let them do whatever they need to do. I want you to shop the perimeter of the store, I want you to shop the fresh things, or frozen, for example, like frozen veggies, that's a great option. Maybe if you're going to do canned, things like beans, stuff like that, we're going to make sure to wash it so we get the salt off of it, and, that we're kind of getting rid of anything like that, that we can to kind of improve the quality of it a little bit. But I don't want you to worry so much about all this other stuff. You're not going to win with the food industry. So they're going to continue to have the money. They're going to continue to do these things. You can choose where to spend your dollars. You can realize, yes, they are artificially messing with the bliss point with how much I want. And so if I don't want to have to create lots of boundaries for myself and really work on this, then maybe you voluntarily. Decrease how often you're having it so that it's really obvious when you have it, how it's affecting you. Okay. So that's one of my main points is that if you have it less often, when you have it, it's going to become very clear to you how it affects you. You're probably actually going to be really tired afterward. So this is one of the things is that I think we're all like, Oh my gosh, candy's so amazing, dah, dah, dah. And then you end up having these things and you realize like, I'm tired. I suddenly want so much water. Like, wow. I'll never forget. I don't remember what it was that I had during the day, but. At night, and I was hydrating the whole day, at night, I was so thirsty. I've never had this happen before, where it was like, I couldn't drink enough. Like my stomach was full. I could not drink more, but I was so thirsty and I just sat there and I was thinking, what did I eat today? And it was processed food. And I think that the salt content was higher than I normally had. I just couldn't even catch up by the next day I had reset, but it was really not a nice experience. So. Yeah. Don't worry about this food industry so much. They will always find food combinations and profiles and ways to make things where it's hyperpalatable, but you get to choose if you even bring these things in the house. Okay, that is an option for you. So in my house, we don't stock super many chips. If we do, they're really the spicy kind that I truly, I don't like, I, my stomach can't handle it. I don't like the taste of my mouth, all of it. And so the kids like that so they can have it, but I don't keep things around all day long that are sort of this like temptation to me now. Where do I use processed food to help me? Some of the protein products I find incredibly helpful. That's for me personally. Now, it's been an art to find which ones work for me and how to make those work for me. So I talk all day long. I really love the Devotion Nutrition products. It's just a flavor profile that I love. Now you can like whatever you do. The other thing that I really love about Devotion is that they are a whey casein base, a mix. And so it bakes really well. Things are fluffy. Also the way that they formulated it, they make like thick protein drinks. So in the morning, I really like the, Fairlife milk, a cup of that, a scoop of the Devotion protein powder, a little bit of maybe some Nescafe instant roast in there, blend that up, put some ice in it, and it's a nice thick consistency. So I love that, right? I sent out to my email list a few weeks ago, by the way, all the recipes that I like with devotion. So make sure that you're on our email list. If you go to rentiaclinic. com, right at the bottom of the first page, you can get on our email list. So I send out things like this every so often, but one of the things that I love, I'll take like a scoop of protein powder, a fourth of a cup of unsweetened applesauce. One scoop of devotion, protein powder, and then plus or minus cinnamon and vanilla extract. Stir that up, microwave for two minutes, and I have a really easy protein product but I'm under no delusion. That's the cheat and the hack and the thing that tastes super yummy and divine and amazing and processed. That's the thing that's helping me out that 20%. But the rest of it is all whole based. Okay. So I don't want you to be under the delusion that now I do devotion and that's everything. No. And even if you follow the founder, Dana Lynn Kay, you will see how she's eating salad. She's eating chicken. She's eating yogurt. She's eating all these things. And then she's making a treat or two per day with that. So do you see how even there it's still ultra processed and we're still having to use it, but it's used for good in my mind for myself. Now, some people are really activated when they have fake sweetened things and they feel like they want more. I have a patient that nothing fake sweetened, otherwise they want to binge. Like it really sets them off. And so we have to do everything. No fake sweeteners, all whole based, right? Like all of that. So you need to see what works for you, but I want you to start with, unless that product is really helping you in health in some capacity. If you're going to have these processed foods, I want you to be aware that there might not be a satiety point for you. Cookies, chips, candy, all of it. It's a very conscious decision. Oftentimes I'll say with my patients, we try to keep added sugar to under 40 grams per day. Now that's still a really good amount. Okay. That's not unrealistic, but you get to start to decide if you can have. Anything you want at times, but not all at the same time, right? So you get to start to decide, okay, this is worth it to me at this time. And then this is the other time, but it's not like all day long, all the time we're doing all these things. We get to start to have a little bit of discretion there. Okay. So the food industry is going to profit. They're always going to try to make options to get you to buy more, to get you to eat more, to get you to do all those things. By the way, they're always trying to outsmart us as well, they've created all the wellness drinks, all the zero calorie drinks that we're buying all day long. They've just pivoted, right? They know that the sugary sodas went down, so now this other market is up. Okay, fine. But you get to decide where you shop, how you shop, how you're fueling your body, and what you're doing with that. I saw another interesting article where you would assume that People are spending less money on food because you're saying, okay, they're eating less, they're buying less, they're losing weight. But ironically, because people are eating less, they're willing to sometimes get better quality of what they are eating because they know that they want it to be, for example, if they're going to have. less stake, maybe they get a better quality. And so it's very interesting, the sort of shift in priorities. I want to give one example that I feel like we can all relate to this. If you are a berry consumer, right? Like strawberries, blueberries, blackberries, those are expensive products, right? But if you have decided like me, hey, blueberries or raspberries or something that really worked for you, you're going to go ahead and prioritize that and not buy other things that you might've bought. So. I want you, when you listen to this episode, to just have a moment and realize, yes, food industry will always be prioritizing making more money. How can they get you to buy more? They will always, behind the scenes, be trying to find foods that, quote unquote, hack the ozempic effect. I don't want you to worry about any of that because we get to decide to not buy things where they have messed around with the flavor profiles and textures and really make it hyper palatable where the bliss points through the roof. So you want more and more. What the bliss point is, by the way, guys, it's when you have a bite of something and you instantly want that second bite, that third bite, like you just want to keep going. Most of us don't have this reaction. I want you to think about when you sit down and you eat an apple or a banana, something like that. It's good, but you're not like, I really want that next bite. You're not having that reaction. Okay, so I just want you to think about, look at the ratios of what you're eating. This is a good chance to do a nutrition audit. And just look at, okay, how many foods am I eating per meal and how many of them are ultra processed? How many of them have ingredients I can't pronounce are stable on the shelf that sit on the pantry? And just really look through that and see, is this serving me or not? And then instead of being so angry with big food all day long, I want you to think about, what is actual health to me? And then by the way, I want to give you a moment of strength here. You also get to decide where your money goes in the sense that you can find usually local farmers or co ops or ways to support more local people. So for example, I know where I am. There's a farmer's market that over the summertime. You can go there and you can buy locally so you can do more of that. Again, co ops. There are different things you can participate in. So if this is something that really matters to you, you can, along your health journey, really create bigger impact as well with environmental effects, supporting local businesses. You get to decide this. Now, you don't have to take everything on at once. Okay, because I think there are a lot of topics that I don't bring to this podcast because I feel like it's just too big and meta and it already feels overwhelming when you're trying to work on your health. But what I want to tell you is sometimes you start to really follow the chain all the way down and you start to really care about all of these things, which I think we really should. You start to care about where your food comes from and how everybody's treated and what happens, right? And you get to decide. a lot of this, but it takes time to first have your metabolic health in such a state where you're not craving and wanting all those things all day long. And I know that that's hard. Okay. I'm going to end today's episode. I hope that you are having a great week. Take a little bit of time this week to look through what you're having. And is it serving you? Do you like how it's going? This might not be a problem for you at all. So if it's not, don't create a problem. But if this is, I want you to think about how can I bring in more whole based foods, right? It's always add, don't subtract. It's really hard to say, get rid of the chips. It's easier to say, hey, How can I bring in more veggies? How can I bring in more fruit? You start with that approach, bringing in more protein, and then you don't have as many ups and downs and you don't want as many of these processed foods. So I want you to give a little bit of thought to that. And if you ever want some help on this, these are the kinds of topics that again, we dig a lot into in the. The top five mistakes that people make when starting a GLP 1. By the way, you don't need to be newly on a GLP 1. Frankly, you don't need to be on a GLP 1 at all, but it's really just a crash course on nutrition with protein, fiber, with movement. We do a lot with, in body scale in there so you can track body composition, but these are the type of things that we would dig into potentially on a call. You can ask any questions. If you're like, Hey, I find that I always want sweets at night. What are some ideas that you have for me? You don't need to have just you could be. In the middle of your fat loss journey, you could be at maintenance, but it's a really nice place where you can come in for six months. You can come to the monthly live Q and a calls. We get the replays up right away. If you can attend live, we send out the document beforehand that says, Hey, do you have any questions for us? So you could always ask. And it's just a good way to learn a lot, really condense down, enjoy that monthly content and really get some good help. Where I say, where it's not sort of. All over the place. We're having to like constantly search things out. It's really all in one place for you. All right. I hope you have an amazing rest of the week and we'll talk soon.